A Glass House Fit for a Family

A midcentury classic gets a stylish, relaxed update

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The wooded suburban towns around New Canaan, Connecticut, are full of the expected Colonials and Capes, but the area is also a secret garden of midcentury-modern glass homes. Many of them were designed by members of the Harvard Five, a group that included Marcel Breuer, Eliot Noyes, and, of course, Philip Johnson, whose own restored glass house is now a historic monument. But not every example has been as fortunate. And as with any garden, without vigilant care, everything gets lost in the brambles and eventually goes to seed.

Jay and Yvonne Fielden came to understand this as they scouted the area with Realtors and noticed how many of the glass houses they viewed had been neglected or redone in ways that would have disheartened the original architects. "They were in sad shape or had been altered to be cozy, Holly Hobbie–type homes," says Yvonne, a social worker now focused on raising the couple's three young children. "The previous owners had no concept of what they had or how to live with it." The house the Fieldens finally bought, up a forested road in Wilton, was suffering from just such an identity crisis. Rooms had been divided inappropriately and painted in Colonial colors. Floral upholstery, plush carpet, and heavy curtains were fighting every original line and angle. But Jay, a writer and editor who wanted a home that would help him maintain his urban edge in the suburbs, saw potential. "It's such an uncommon layout for a glass house because it's multilevel and flanked, which creates privacy," he says. All the couple required was a team to nurse it back to health.

"I really thought of this as a restoration," says Robert Dean, the architect hired for the project, who has worked for Philip Johnson and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. "We had to take away the things that had been done wrong and bring back things consistent with the architect's original vision." But not entirely consistent, because the house, built in the early 1960s by James Evans, who studied at Yale under Louis Kahn, imposed a typically modernist rigor, with small bedrooms, bathrooms, and closets, and a pint-size kitchen. "It seemed more like a bachelor pad than a family home to me," Jay says.

"With three little kids, we needed a place that would be both functional and forgiving," adds Yvonne, who jokes that the playhouse in the yard would be more aesthetically suitable if it also had a modernist flat roof, not its prosaic peaked one. Dean sought to make the house work for a modern young family with a cluttered life.

The Fieldens wanted a forgiving interior designer as well, and they found one in Jesse Carrier, who laid out Jay's office when he was editor in chief of Men's Vogue. "Jay and Yvonne inherited a lot of stuff from their families," says Carrier, who codesigned the home with his wife, Mara Miller. Much of it had nothing to do with modernism. There were only a few period-appropriate items—a George Nelson bench, a Heywood-Wakefield chest of drawers, a daybed by Edward Wormley, and a couple of slipper chairs. What to do with the Chinese porcelain panels, family paintings from the 1930s, Chippendale-style breakfront, and French Provincial dining table, all from Yvonne's Southern mother, who was downsizing just as her daughter was renovating? And on top of that, what about the Navajo blankets, racks of antlers, and tomahawks from Jay's Texas clan? And there was Jay's art to deal with, too—works by Irving Penn, Walton Ford, and others.

"I integrated, mixed, and edited, and I refused what wouldn't work," says Carrier. He is inspired more by the sleek, eclectic style of Billy Baldwin than by midcentury purity. "Sometimes it's easier when people bring their own things. When you start from scratch, there are always so many more revisions before you begin." So into the living room (with wood floors stained dark to match the ceiling beams and window frames) went Yvonne's baby grand and Jay's sword table. Into the master bedroom went a screen with a Venetian scene and cherished paintings; a floating wall hides extra storage space for the stylish couple's wardrobes. Arrowhead collection, mounted bass, and old trophies? The library. Vintage sofa and wicker furniture from Yvonne's mother? Into the den and onto the porch. To complement the varied collections, Carrier added quirky touches—chocolate-brown walls here, red IKEA shelves there. Meanwhile, the expanded master bath was given a full makeover, with slate tiles reminiscent of Frank Lloyd Wright and Albert Frey. The downstairs children's rooms were brightened with printed curtains and classic flokati rugs. In the kitchen, the decorator ripped out the terra-cotta floors and added a window, white cabinets, and Italian-limestone counters. "I wake up and can't believe I get to live here with a family," Jay says. Adds Yvonne, "Thank God Jesse is who he is, or putting this together would have been a struggle."

As for the genial Carrier, he was happy to help turn a glass house into a functional home. "What doesn't work," he says with an easy laugh, "is in the garage." Under an architecturally appropriate flat roof.